Alpine believes it is better off with Gasly than Piastri
F1 News
- GPblog.com
Otmar Szafnauer is happy with his driver duo for 2023. Although Alpine had hoped for Oscar Piastri, the French racing stable's team boss thinks it is better off with Pierre Gasly as Esteban Ocon's teammate.
With Ocon and Gasly, Alpine will have an all-French line-up in 2023, but the announcement of this driver duo did not go smoothly. First Fernando Alonso left for Aston Martin, then the team itself went wrong when announcing Piastri. Indeed, the latter had signed a contract with McLaren and Alpine lost the lawsuit it filed.
Gasly better than Piastri?
Gasly was eventually snatched from AlphaTauri and with Gasly and Ocon, the team for 2023 has two drivers with some years of experience in F1, but the two are also still very young. Szafnauer stated to Autosport.com that he is happy with the driver duo for 2023 and even thinks Alpine is better off than it would have been in winning the court case.
Indeed, instead of rookie Piastri, Gasly will now take his place in next year's Alpine and he has considerably more experience. According to Szafnauer, time will tell which of the two is faster, but the team boss is now putting his money on Gasly. Piastri will be in action for rival McLaren in 2023 alongside Lando Norris.